CNN "money-honey" accidentally speaks some truth

[SoCalDem]

She went on and on in her dulcid, calming tone...reassuring us that "the market will recover"..even showed a chart that proves that when people "remove their money from the market", it's always followed by a BIG increase, that they miss out on..

Then she said it..

"if you had put 10K in the market TEN YEARS AGO, it would be worth $13K today"..

This was supposed to be reassuring to the "folks about to retire..

How many people do YOU know, who are "near retirement" today (60-ish), who ALSO even HAD 10K to "spare" a decade ago.. What everyone forgets, is that as people enter their 40's & 50's, supposedly their "most productive" (financially) years, several OTHER things are usually happening:

1) parents aging & needing assistance (time and/or money)
2) corporatization/globalization forced early-retirements/layoffs
3) children needing college assistance
4) chronic illnesses start to pop up, just as medical care becomes more expensive/hard to come by..especially for those who are pushed out of longtime jobs, and lose company-sponsored healthcare insurance

There is also a "bubble" of boomers who missed out on the defined benefit pensions of yesteryear, and for whom the 401-k came too late in their careers to be of much real benefit.

What many forget is that as obligations increase, there is less and less "extra" money to invest...even if the "experts" all say everyone should invest for their old age...

There is also the sad fact that the "little guy" who has the hardest time coming up with "extra" money to invest, always seems to be the first one to "lose it all" when those same experts routinely loot the financial system.

One trip through the television landscape shows how "invested" the networks are in the "market"..and in getting the "little guy" to "feel" invested.

Media of today has a vested interest in getting most of us into the market. They sell us stuff via advertising sold to them by their corporate buddies. They have trained many of us to "watch the market"..they even "gave" us whole channels devoted to nothing else. Just hours and hours of happy smiling people, all "experts"..eager to lead us into the market.

These people are not altruistic geniuses, willing to share their wisdom.They are corporate shills. They may not throwing down their crutches in the revival tent, claiming that the traveling preacher has healed them & they can now walk again...but they are still planted shills ...they are pumping up the enthusiasm for gambling on the market, thereby enriching their corporate masters, and hopefully keeping their own jobs & health care & maybe a book deal or a better time slot.

Just think.. If we all HAD "invested" that $10k of "extra" money way back in 1998, we'd either have that $13K now (and the wildly exotic retirement it could have brought us), or the bail-out could have been $900 Billion :)

History has shown us that every 15-20 years, "they" will take whatever is there..

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Oooh! A 3% annual return!

:party:

...when real inflation is at least 8% annually.

[Lance_Boyle]

2. The 'accidental truth' is a 30% gain over10 years?

Damn those positive returns - CNN should let us all go on thinking that only suckers invest.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

3. It's a wash at best and more likely a loss in real dollars. nt